


Brutal critical

by foughtyen



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Academy phase, Dungeons and Dragons but make it not copyrighted, Gen, Lost items
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-18
Updated: 2020-05-18
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:35:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,082
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24245872
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foughtyen/pseuds/foughtyen
Summary: Lysithea finds a twelve-sided die.
Relationships: Sylvain Jose Gautier & Lysithea von Ordelia
Comments: 7
Kudos: 22





	Brutal critical

**Author's Note:**

> Can you believe that Sylvain is canonically into board games because I still can't, what a nerd. (This nonsense brought to you by my lvl 13 barb who hasn't seen action in a year... oop.)

Lysithea’s voice cuts through the early winter air. “Sylvain, you lost something.” Breathing in afterwards feels like a chore.

A roughly-cut fragment had fallen from Sylvain’s sleeve and clinked along the floor, bouncing like a skipped stone.

“What is this strange shard?” Lysithea scrutinizes it, her first two fingers clamped tight. One through twelve are inset in ink over each face, which is otherwise identical to the rest.

Sylvain’s mouth opens in surprise. “That’s my die! so I’ll be taking it.” He cups his hand expectantly.

“I know what this is,” Lysithea declares, quarantining it beneath judgmental fingers. “This die, really? Gambling?”

For all that he prides himself on being smooth, Sylvain’s poker face needs work.

“It’s not surprising that you engage in this sort of illicit activity, but it is surprising that you would be so careless in revealing it.”

It starts with a chuckle, then Sylvain erupts with laughter.

Lysithea had raised her hand to return the die, but now it presses into her palm, the grain of sand that will become the pearl of her anger. “Explain yourself.”

“Whoa, whoa.” Sylvain gestures surrender. “I was laughing at what you said. I’m not gambling. Guess even a brilliant and perceptive mind like yours can be led astray sometimes.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Like, what’s the opposite of _a stopped clock is right twice a day_? Like, you’re so sharp, but at the same time so—“

“I know what the words mean. I don’t understand how I could be wrong.” She bristles as she understands his backhanded complements for what they are and weighs ending the conversation. The professor could take care of this with ease, or maybe Seteth could give him a glorious scolding.

Sylvain’s eyes dart anxiously back and forth along the corridor, as if he were crossing a street in the town below the monastery. “I could show you what I use it for. I... uh, I like games, right?”

“Playing games with girls? I recall this. You better not be doing that right now, wasting both of our times.” 

“No, like, _board_ games.”

“That information, I _don’t_ recall.”

“We’re actually meeting in my room right now.” Sylvain finger-lances in the direction of the stairs to the noble dorms. “There’s hot chocolate.”

“I’m in.” If this is a bust, at least she’ll have had hot chocolate.

A wave of wax-scented heat breaks over them as Sylvain opens the door. Some of the candles are tinted pink. Scented with rose petals, probably. Typical Sylvain.

She spends so long scrutinizing the setting she nearly misses Raphael sitting cross-legged behind a low table, carefully prying meat from a drumstick and forking it into his mouth. That takes concentration; even bunched he has the presence of a boulder.

“Hey Raphael, look what I found!”

Lysithea doesn’t remember returning the die, but there it is between Sylvain’s fingers.

Raphael’s eyes light up. He swallows his mouthful of meat. “My die!”

“It was in his sleeve.” Lysithea looks askance.

“Oh, I hate it when that happens! Thanks for keeping it safe, Sylvain. Yargh wouldn’t have been able to do much of anything without his handy twelve-sided die.”

“Hear that Lysithea? I couldn’t have asked him to say it better. I’ll give you inspiration for that.”

“Awesome!” Raphael says through another mouthful of chicken.

“What say you, Lysithea?”

“I see you were being truthful about the purpose. Now, where is the hot chocolate you promised?”

“I drank it all.” Raphael peers guiltily at the empty bottom of a deep mug, where the syrup has congealed into the thinnest brown disk. “Thought it was just going to be me. I’d go with you to the dining commons if it weren’t so cold, but...”

“It’s no matter, you didn’t know.” Lysithea invites herself to sit on Sylvain’s bed. “Don’t mind me, I’ll observe.”

She learns what the twelve-sided die is for. Sylvain and Raphael tell each other a chapter in the story of Yargh, an orphaned, overmuscled do-gooder who cares about his younger sister, Margh. At one point they use small figures to simulate a battle, and the twelve-sided die makes an entrance. It’s clear they’ve played this game for some time; the rules are still not apparent.

“You look interested, Lysithea.” Raphael notices. “Want to play with us? Usually there’s a bigger group, but today was an individual session for Yargh. His own paralogue”

“I have many questions. Firstly, isn’t this game rather juvenile?” She considers the little figurines, how they fall within the realm of doll-adjacent and are therefore to be avoided.

“Whoa, it’s so _not_ juvenile.” Sylvain flushes defensively. “It’s called Caverns and Creatures. It fosters creativity and improves one’s ability to work in small groups in a collaborative setting.”

“And that’s another line item on your quest to woo women.” Lysithea deduces.

“If he’s doing all this to impress girls, he’s putting in a lot of effort.” Raphael wields a pencil like a toothpick in his gargantuan hand, paying meticulous attention to summing some numbers.

“It’s also informative that your fantasy persona is a projection of your aspirations. Is that the purpose this serves? A form of goal setting?”

Raphael thinks about it. “Not on purpose or anything, but I think we like seeing ourselves succeed.”

“Next I suppose you’ll tell me you’re not aware you can use it to create probabilistic models for tactical simulations.”

Sylvain’s hands look for somewhere to put his frustration. “Okay, okay. No. I invite you into my room, Raphael invites you into our game, and all you do is criticize us? That’s not great.”

Lysithea’s gaze follows patterns in the carpeting. “My remarks weren’t meant as criticism.” She eyes the figurines jealously. “And I would like to play with them. I mean— oh shit.”

“Haha!” Raphael’s hearty laughter booms, each hitch in breath punctuated by a fist on the table. The last one knocks the mug onto the floor. “We have a convert! Do you have a character idea yet?”

Lysithea rights the mug, shocked but not surprised to see a scantily-clad woman and _Visit Derdriu_ painted on the side previously hidden. “Of course. Her name is Lily and she’s a polymathic prodigy.”

Sylvain stands to stretch. “I don’t know—”

“Sylvain, you know, this is the most genuine thing I’ve seen you do. You should take care of it.”

“Ahahah what...” Sylvain melts a little. “ _Maybe_ we can keep you around.”

Lysithea gasps.

“Oh fine, you’re in.”

“Okay, first steps. How do I acquire one of these _minis_?”

**Author's Note:**

> “So you see professor, minis are like socially sanctioned dolls. Also, the other people in the group don’t mind if I run calculations with dice on my own time.”
> 
> The professor nods, leaning into her palm.
> 
> “I would say I’ve found an optimal solution.”


End file.
